There had been Wallingham meetings of remarkable enthusiasm; his supporters called them epoch-making, as if epochs were made of cheers.

But the workingman of Great Britain was declaring stolidly in the by-elections against any favour to colonial produce at his expense, thereby showing himself one of those humble instruments that Providence uses for the downfall of arrogant empires.

It will be thus, no doubt, that the workingman will explain in the future his eminent usefulness to the government of his country, and it will be in these terms that the cost of educating him by means of the ballot will be demonstrated.
Meanwhile we may look on and cultivate philosophy; or we may make war upon the gods with Mr Wallingham which is, perhaps, the better part.
That, to turn from recrimination, was what they saw in Canada looking across--the queerest thing of all was the recalcitrance of the farm labourer; they could only stare at that--and it may be that the spectacle was depressing to hopeful initiative.

At all events, it was plain that the new policy was suffering from a certain flatness on the further side.

As a ballon d'essai it lacked buoyancy; and no doubt Mr Farquharson was right in declaring that above all things it lacked actuality, business--the proposition, in good set terms, for men to turn over, to accept or reject.